Improving Ambulatory Patient Satisfaction

Patients Satisfaction Improvement Plan
Name:
Institution:
Introduction
Patient satisfaction is one of the elements in health care that is quite challenging, but one that can be achieved with sustainable measures (Farber, 2010). Ambulatory surgery patients are some of the most vulnerable to the various shortcomings at any given hospital relative to their nature of treatment and emergency responses that really expose the inadequacies of a hospital and the staff.With the number of persons in the US population at the age of 65 expected to be at 20% by the year 2030, outpatient surgeries are also expected to rise with the figure. With these rising numbers, patient satisfaction is going to take a more central stage in the health care delivery systems. Other than the state of the facilities in terms of their physical appearance and ease of use, it is the interaction between the patients and the medical teams that makes the greatest impact on the level of satisfaction that the patients will have. The latter is found to have a positive correlation to the level of patient satisfaction and their likely to seek medical assistance from the same facility on a later date or even recommend it to any of their friends or family (Walrath, Tomallo-Bowman, & Maguire, 2004).
Situation analysis
Following concerns that the patients at the ambulatory sections were experiencing poor satisfaction with the level of services that they got, there were several aspects that were evaluated to establish the extent of the problem. One of the tests that were carried out involved the level of education of the nurses regarding the ability to offer quality care. According to the external report, the nurses scored poorly prompting the need to educate the managers and the nurses on quality care for the ambulatory patients. An analysis of the nurses’ questionnaires indicated sharp discontent with their work and their perception of the hospital was weak and had a negative attitude. Later on, random patients were requested to fill out open ended questionnaires and score card to establish the level of dissatisfaction with the level of health care their received, their attitudes and perceptions towards the hospital (Farber, 2010). Like the previous test, the patient expressedelaborate concerns with reference to delays on progress reports, quality of the hospital spaces, and response to complaints. The turnover rate of the nurses according to the records had gone up by 10% in the last four years.
Plan To Improve Ambulatory Patient Satisfaction
The first step towards the process of improving care, will involve meeting with the nurse managers and the hospital managers and sensitizing on the need to get level of patient satisfaction much higher. This will also work to enhance the results of the project as the managers will use their authority to enforce the various changes that will be proposed in the project.
Quality care is going to be part of the policy reforms at the hospital starting with training the nurses and the various managers at the ambulatory section on quality care delivery (Farber, 2010). This will help boost the level of skills among the nurses and medical teams to make sure that the patients and their families receive the most polis...